Outing Yourself by Michelangelo Signorile

Within these very institutions, closeted lesbians and gay men occupy crucial positions - the 'Closets of Power' of Signorile's subtitle - and thus play an active part in their own oppression, as they help to perpetuate the agony of others like them. He argues that the three major institutions sustaining homophobia are 'the Trinity of the Closet' - the news media (which willfully hide the homosexuality of public figures), the political system (which demands closeting and has rarely offered legislative safeguards to gay men and lesbians) and the entertainment industry (which disseminates negative images of homosexuals).

It is here that the strategy of 'outing' plays a part in Signorile's analysis. Worse yet, according to Signorile, is the fact that there are powerful closeted gay men and lesbians in the very institutions that sustain homophobia, and these men and women acquiesce - or even participate - in the oppression of other homosexuals. Politically, the closet perpetuates homophobia by allowing charges of homosexuality to smear and shame, instead of providing a moment of pride or an opportunity for education. But it stunts even as it shelters, guaranteeing a life of fear and deception. The closet, says Signorile, provides a sense of shelter in a culture that attacks homosexuality at every turn.

In a world where parents are homophobic and peer culture is violently anti-gay, social experience drives gay teenagers into the closet. He begins, in the book's most vivid section, by describing the agony of growing up homosexual. And, while Queer in America is much more than a defense of outing, the author works throughout the book to make a case for the political tactic he helped to originate. He has achieved his greatest fame by announcing the homosexuality of prominent-but-closeted gays - 'outing' them - through his column in the now defunct publication Out Week. Signorile is a leader in a new generation of gay activists. Mixing rage, reflection and reportage, this unusual book scrambled my suppositions even when it didn't change my mind. CAN I TRUST an author who is eager to 'name names' for political purposes? Could I agree with an activist who scorns the right of privacy? How much homophobia do I bring to a book by a gay radical? Queer in America by Michelangelo Signorile pressed me with questions like this at every turn of the page.

Outing Yourself by Michelangelo Signorile